Transgender athlete ban heading to S Carolina House floor

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A proposal to ban transgender students from playing girls’ and women’s sports in public South Carolina high schools and colleges is moving through the state House after stalling twice last year.

Members of the House Education and Public Works Committee didn't comment on the bill before they voted 11-2 Thursday to send the proposal to the chamber floor.

The legislation would require athletes to compete with the gender listed on their birth certificates.

Lawmakers did spend nearly two hours listening to testimony on and discussing the bill Wednesday, with opponents walking out of the meeting about an hour in. The group SC United for Justice and Equality said the walkout was prompted by the bill's supporters using insults and slurs to demonize transgender people.

“I want lawmakers to know that no one and no thing — not even women’s sports — needs to be saved from transgender people," said Wynston Sanders, a leader with the group, in a statement Thursday. “We are simply trying to live authentic, full lives. There are so many more stories about transgender people than the stories about these bills that try to target us and bring us down.”

Democratic lawmakers raised questions about how the legislation would affect situations where South Carolina teams are set to play out-of-state teams with trans athletes, or which teams intersex students would be allowed to be on.

About a dozen states have already passed similar legislation, and transgender athletes have become an issue in midterm campaigns in states like Pennsylvania. But Republicans aren’t in lockstep, with GOP governors in Indiana and Utah vetoing bans in their states.

Two dozen state lawmakers sponsoring such measures around the country as well as the conservative groups supporting them also...